Long-lost ship found 95 years after disappearing near the Bermuda Triangle

The SS Cotopaxi — a steamship that vanished near the Bermuda Triangle in 1925 — has been found off the coast of St. Augustine, Fla., providing a solution to one of the world’s great unsolved mysteries.

“It was incredibly exciting,” Michael Barnette, one of the researchers who found the wreck, told HuffPost. “I’ve done a countless number of shipwreck dives but this one truly stood out.”

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The SS Cotopaxi disappeared in November 1925 while on its way to Cuba with no signs of it or its 32 crew members. The lost ship became the subject of Bermuda Triangle conspiracy theories and was frequently referenced in pop culture, including in Steven Spielberg’s “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.”

The ship’s disappearance is actually no great mystery: it was hiding in plain sight all along.

After meticulously going through records, Barnette and his team found evidence of a previously unreported distress call from the Cotopaxi. Using the coordinates from the signal and other information known about the ship’s route, they narrowed in on a site known as Bear Wreck which had actually been found 35 years ago.

After several dives, the researchers concluded that the heretofore unidentified ship at Bear Wreck was actually the Cotopaxi.

“There were several elements that confirmed the identity such as the dimensions of the ship, it’s length and the measurement of the boiler,” Barnette told HuffPost. “Also, I looked at the general orientation of the machinery. It was all consistent with the information we knew about the Cotopaxi.”

The discovery will be featured on the premiere episode of a new Science Channel TV show called “Shipwreck Secrets” in February.